Implementation of the System of Securing Quality with TQM Method as an Innovative Process in Companies

Total Quality Management (TQM) system may be considered a kind of organizational innovation, which has been spreading in the global economy for decades and which is significantly different from other changes in industrial organizations. The theory of innovation coincides with results of researches on the process and effects of TQM implementation in the companies; growing competition is the basic motive for implementing TQM. When quality starts to be systematically considered a factor for competitive advantage by companies on a given market, the actual question is no more whether to implement TQM or not but how profound and how fast the changes we want to achieve should be. Companies implement TQM to secure a more or less stable status of a leader on its market. Further, a one-time implementation of TQM may not be enough as a kind of race concerning quality level may occur among competing companies which apply TQM. In this context it is important to remember that every company displays a specific, natural pace of organizational change. If TQM is implemented at that precise pace, the process is not particularly costly. However, if we want to achieve tangible effects, like quality improvement, significantly quicker, the company has to pay the price of this greater speed. Models of absorption of innovation can help explain whether TQM implementation is a strictly rational choice of the company, or a decision based on imitation. Companies implement TQM especially under the pressure of imitation when on a given market business processes are so transparent for external subjects (consumers, investors), that the subjects can judge, without official certificates, how the companies apply the assumptions of TQM.